IB Diploma News

26 January 2018

Students in Year 13 are in the process of finalising their Diploma Core components. With the Theory of Knowledge Presentation done and the essay first draft handed in it is important that students stay on track with each part of the core.

Students need to complete their viva voce in the next two weeks as well as their final reflection. This will complete the Extended Essay process and allow students to move closer towards just focussing on revising for the final exams. The sooner this can get started the better. I include CAS in this as students can often prolong the process by not keeping up to date with their reflections as well as obtaining supervisor reviews. As always, with each of these parts of the core, I am happy to answer any questions you may have. A few parents have asked for me to include a link to the Extended Essay website so I have included it here.

Year 12

Thank you to the parents who have already logged on to their ManageBac profile and provided feedback. Please do take the time to log on and search your child’s profile to see what great CAS experiences they are taking and the reflections they are making. If you have not logged on, and are not sure how to, please find the ManageBac email which would have been sent to your account last Friday. If you cannot find this email then please email me and I will arrange for the email to be resent.

Students have also made their Extended Essay choices with the timeline for their journey below. We have asked parents to sign the Extended Essay form to include them in the process and we will be running some workshops for parents later on this academic year in order to help you better understand the process and how it is assessed. Student’s first task in the next few weeks will be to meet with their supervisor so they have a research direction to follow over the Chinese New Year holiday.

Deadline Date

Task

Method of submission

25th January

Submission of this form, signed by both yourself and a parent/guardian

Hand a hard copy of this form to Mr Housham

29th January – 9th February

First meeting with supervisor

Discussed research to be recorded on ManageBac on the ‘to do’ list section

16th March

First draft of research question

Recorded on ManageBac

12th April

Final submission of research question

Recorded on ManageBac and agreed upon by supervisor (the research question may change depending on outcome of further research but not significantly)

16th April

First reflection made on the planning and progress form

Recorded on ManageBac and checked by supervisor.

10th May

Submission of Extended Essay plan and Introduction

Word document uploaded to ManageBac. The Introduction should match the criteria found on pages 62-64 of the Extended Essay textbook.

10th September

First draft of Extended Essay

Uploaded to ManageBac

17th September

Second reflection made on the planning and progress form

Recorded on ManageBac and checked by supervisor.

5th November

Final draft of Extended Essay

Uploaded to ManageBac

7th December

Third and final reflection made on the planning and progress form

Recorded on ManageBac and checked by supervisor.

Thomas Housham, Head of IB Academy

Diploma Programme Deadlines

Each week we will publish the deadlines for students so you can help support them at home. Below are the deadlines for this week and the week after the Christmas holidays. It is extremely important students stick to these as they have been carefully arranged to make the Diploma Programme manageable. Year 12 deadlines are now below also. The whole deadline calendar for Year 12 students for this academic year has been shared with them via email. They have this as an excel file so they can filter down to their subjects.

Year 13

Subject

Description of Work

Date due

Economics

IA1 final submission

22 January 2018

Geography

IA final submission

23 January 2018

English B

First draft of Written Assignment due

24 January 2018

Business Management

IA final submission

25 January 2018

Science

1st draft of IA due

26 January 2018

Dutch A

Written task 3 final submission

29 January 2018

Economics

IA3 final submission

31 January 2018

Mandarin ab initio

Written assignment final submission

2 February 2018

Chinese B SL

Written assignment final submission

2 February 2018

Year 12

Subject

Description of Work

Date due

Extended Essay

Submssion of subject choice

25 January 2018

Economics

IA1 Microeconomics final draft

31 January 2018

Computer Science

IA proposal

01 February 2018

English Language and Literature SL / HL

First draft of WT1 Language

02 February 2018

Creativity, Activity, Service News

Chatterbox Coffee Shop

Our first BISS coffee shop is now open! This is a very exciting opportunity for any of our students who are interested in getting involved and turning it into a CAS experience. The beauty of CAS is that anything can be turned into a CAS experience as long as students are thinking about their goals and why they want to challenge themselves to it. Some opportunities that our students could explore are, but not limited to:

Getting involved in the design and marketing of Chatterbox.

Run the business by taking stock checks and keeping tabs of the accounts.

Get experience of the service industry by working at the Coffee Shop during the weekends when there are events at school.

Coordinating the charity element of the venture.

Turning the space into a public exhibition.

This is a fantastic experience for our students to take ownership of and make it their own. There will be a meeting and a training session run by our parents who are running Chatterbox next week. Any student interested should come and see me.

On Saturday 10th March 2018, we will be holding a university fair for parents and students. This is a fantastic opportunity for students and parents to meet with university representatives from Higher Education institutions around the world, and will be especially important for current Year 11 and 12 students to attend. More and more universities are signing up to attend every week.

The full list of Universities attending is still being confirmed, and is being constantly added to! Some of the universities currently attending are

From Europe (non-UK): American University of Rome, Bocconi University, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Gilon & Les Roches School of Hospitality and Hotel Management, IE University, Jacobs University Bremen, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, IESEG School of Management, Universidad de Navarra, Emlyon Business School, American University of Paris, University College Utrecht …

From Asia-Pacific: Asia Europe Business School, Australia Institute of Music, Australia National University, Chinese University of Hong Kong, City University Hong Kong, Hong Kong University of Science & Technology (HKUST), Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong University (HKU), Nagoya University, Rochester Intstitute of Technology, SUNY Korea, The University of Sydney, University Of Queensland, Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University

A letter with more information will be given to students later in the term.